Paddy worth Rs 15 cr suspected missing from 6 Moga rice mills

Paddy worth Rs 15 crore has gone missing from six rice mills in Moga, officials of Markfed claimed here. Meanwhile, the police registered a case against Kapoor Rice Mill at Kot Ise Khan on the complaint of the district manager of Markfed after as many as 19,413 bags of paddy have been allegedly found short at the mill.

Meanwhile, the police registered a case against Kapoor Rice Mill at Kot Ise Khan on the complaint of the district manager of Markfed after as many as 19,413 bags of paddy have been allegedly found short at the mill.

The case has been registered under section 406 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).

The mill management had also reportedly taken a loan from Punjab National Bank by giving the surety of paddy stocked with them.

The bank is learnt to have sealed the godowns of the mill wherein the stock was after the latter failed to repay loan.

The shortage of paddy was detected by Markfed officials in March during the physical verification of the rice mill.

Sources said the agency had stocked about 2,13,540 bags of paddy for milling for 2012-13. Though the rice mill delivered about 1,56,285 bags by November 2013, the stock of 19,413 bags was found missing from the remaining 57,255 bags which were due towards the rice mill.

This is not an isolated case of paddy going missing.

There are five more rice mills, four located at Dharmkot and one at Ajitwal, from which the agency has found large number of paddy bags gone missing.

“The agency has found the shortage of paddy worth about Rs 15 crore at about six rice mills in Moga district. Four of them are located at Dharmkot, one at Kot Ise Khan and one at Ajitwal,” confirmed Nishan Singh, district manager of Markfed, Moga.

“The shortage was found during the physical verification of the rice mills about 7 to 8 months back and we had immediately informed the authorities concerned about it. We had filed also complaint in this regard. But the inquiry, being conducted at different levels, by anti-fraud teams or others is still going on,” he said. Sources said a large quantity of paddy was found missing from the four rice mills at Dharmkot by the agency.

“The police have registered the case against Kapoor Rice Mill. Investigation is going on,” said sub-inspector Harpal Singh of the Kot Ise Khan police station. He is the investigating officer in this case.